Two years after the Bridge to Nowhere earned its infamous nickname, CDOT is taking new steps to make it go somewhere. The bridge – actually an overpass spanning Highway 160 – is now the focus of a public comment period designed to lead to federal approval that would hook the bridge up to a still-to-be-built interchange across a historic Durango-area ranch.
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When the impressive, three-lane overpass was built in 2009, it had motorists intantly scratching their heads because one end of the bridge dead ends into a hillside. It turned out that CDOT officials had put the cart before the proverbial horse, or in this case, the bridge before the access to a connecting road. CDOT planned to cut a road across the Webb Ranch, but the ranch owners don’t care for that idea and have a gang of lawyers and engineers to try to convince the Colorado Department of Transportation that their bridge connection should do somewhere else. So, in the meantime, it has continued to go nowhere.

While locals laugh about Durango’s newest unnatural wonder, CDOT is seriously trying to move ahead on the bridge that is part of a $455 million project that will create an improved 16-mile corridor that will link Highway 160 to Highway 550 between Durango and Bayfield and do away with the steep and hair-raising section of road known as Farmington Hill. Watch for a decision on the bridge connection in the spring.

Nancy has been covering the diverse news of Western Colorado for three decades, since she migrated to the mountains from the plains of Nebraska. For the past 13 years, she has been a staff writer for The Denver Post, working from a bureau office in Grand Junction. In her spare time, she's been completing a Spanish Literature degree at Mesa State College in Grand Junction and continuing her quest to bike every pass in Colorado.